Draco Malfoy's Nine Reasons Why
by LightsWrites
Summary: There wasn't a single person at Hogwarts who hadn't asked themselves why Draco Malfoy committed suicide. The investigating team wrote it off as post war stress. His parents blamed the school. Nine people knew a different story though, and Draco was going to make sure they remembered.
1. Chapter 1

They are in their 7th year of Hogwarts, after the war, towards the end of the school year in April. DH compliant except Hermione and Ron were never an item.

* * *

 **Reason Number Nine**

Hermione bent the corners of the pages for what felt like the hundredth time that night. It didn't matter if she wanted to destroy it. It didn't matter if she didn't want to listen to what it quite literally was saying.

There was no way to defeat this problem, except by doing the one thing she didn't want to do.

"Hermione?" Ron said, gently trying to take the book from her hands.

Hermione gripped it tighter and tucked it under her arm.

"What's going on with you?" He asked. "You haven't let go of that book in the past few weeks. It's like you haven't even been in the same room with us. It's like Ginny in our second year all over again."

"It's nothing, Ron," she said. "It's just a notebook."

It was a lie.

The book was undamaged. It shouldn't have been though. It had been read from start to finish over eight times.

"Harry," he called across the room. "She's been acting like a loon, yeah?"

Harry shook his head. "Not at all. Leave her alone."

"I'm tired," she said, standing up from her chair. "I'll see you two in the morning."

"Bet it's all that reading you've been doing!" Hermione was already up the stairs when he called after her, louder this time. "Must be hard to read when there's no words!"

He couldn't see them. Only a few people could, and she was one of the unlucky ones that was able. If he knew what was in the pages, he wouldn't be teasing her.

Her dorm was empty. As it should be, since almost none of the students came back for the "8th" year. There were only a few people, and even they were dwindling out, opting for careers instead of finishing their education.

And it was times like these that she was grateful.

She sat on her bed and lit the room bright as day with the flick of her wand.

She hadn't had a proper night's sleep in over 3 months, and the past two weeks had been even worse. Two weeks without sleep wasn't anything compared to what he had gone through.

The chapters had simple titles.

Numbers and names.

And she knew _every_. _single_. _name_.

The chapters were to be read in order. Each chapter contained an explanation.

The entirety of the book was the key to the question everyone had been asking.

 _Why did Draco Malfoy kill himself?_

 **Three weeks prior:**

Hermione was late for class. It was a chilly outside, and most of the students were avoiding the open air of the courtyard, even if it would spare them time. She had forgotten her coat, and in her haste to make it out of the cold, almost missed her former professor.

"Miss Granger?" Sibil Trelawney said, her voice as soft as a whisper. She had a book in her hand stretched as far away from her body as she could get it. Her hands were unsteady, and it looked like she was about to toss the book at her.

"Professor?" Hermione didn't reach for the book, and barely glanced over it before looking away. She wasn't in Divination this year, as she wasn't required to. She couldn't have possibly forgotten it.

There were tears brimming over her already reddened eyes. The glasses were only highlighting what looked to be a plea.

"Did you want me to give this to one of your students?" she asked, taking the book in hopes to keep the teacher from crying in front of her.

She shook her head and let go of the book. "This is from Draco."

Hermione didn't move. Couldn't move. There were a million questions running through her head. She didn't get to ask even one, though. Before she even blinked, her former professor dropped her head and fled from scene.

She reminded herself that class started in five minutes, but her heart was taking her straight to the library.

The library was warm that day, but she felt chills down to her bones. The back corner was always empty, and very seldom visited by staff. In-depth wizarding law books weren't popular research. A student would have to be masochist to read anything where she was.

The binding was plain black leather and gave no indication to its contents.

She flipped to the first page.

' _Hello, Hermione'_

The words weren't merely written. His voice echoed in her head as she read.

The book fell sharply to the ground. She stared at the book for what seemed like an eternity. Was it dark magic? Some sort of mind control? Sibil sure looked out of her mind earlier, but that wasn't much to go off of.

The book- No. The diary, so eerily familiar to Tom Riddle's own memory. There was no mistaking it. Draco Malfoy had created a Horcrux

If it was left on the floor, it would certainly be picked up by someone in the future. The book had a pull to it, something that was begging for it to be read. Hermione wanted to run away from it. The horror that Draco could have…

But instead, she picked it up and pulled the cover back once more.

' _Hello again, Hermione._ '

' _Try not to drop me again. I have quite a few important things to tell you.'_

Hermione brought out her quill and ink. She pressed the ink into the paper, and it faded just as quickly as it was written.

' _I'm sorry, Hermione. Unfortunately, this won't be an open discussion.'_

She placed the feather to the side and read on.

' _I know you're bright enough to know what this is. First, I want to ease your mind. I didn't murder just anyone to make this happen. There was a process… Back and forth… Back and forth… I fought with myself on whether this was the way to go about telling my story. It took me a month before realizing this was the only way._

' _It may seem monstrous for me to even contemplate doing something so extreme. But the person I murdered to create this was none other than myself. There is no other version of me left in this world. Not my body. Nor are there any other parts of my wicked soul. You're holding what's left of the miserable Draco Malfoy._

' _You, like the people before you, will have an opportunity to make sense of my death, and how you played a part. Each of you has your own free will… Any one of the people before you were permitted to destroy this book, without any physical harm to themselves. However, if any of them had chosen this route, the contents would have been made public by an entrusted third party. You also have this right. The choice is, of course, yours._

 _You're probably wondering how you could have possibly played a part in this._

 _The answer will be in your chapter._

The names were appearing on the page, one by one, line by line. Draco's clear and crisp voice reading them off without emotion. Chapters to the diary, and all the people who led to his death.

 _Astoria Greengrass_

 _Cormac McLaggen_

 _Pansy Parkinson_

 _Dennis Creevey_

 _Padma Patil_

 _Harry Potter_

 _Theodore Knott_

 _Professor Trelawney_

 _Hermione Granger_

The last name. Her name. She forgot to breathe. It was impossible. She shouldn't be on that list. She wouldn't have done anything to hurt him.

' _Hermione,-"_

"Hermione!" Harry called, he was running towards her, but stopped short, starring at the black book in her hand.

Harry cautiously approached the desk and sat down across from her at the table.

"How long have you known? That this?"

"A week," he replied.

"Why are we in here?"

"We can't talk about it- not until you've read it."

"How could you not have told me? Why didn't you destroy it?" she asked, jerking the book in front of him. "This is a bloody Horcrux! You, better than anyone, should have known-"

"I did!" he said. "I've known since I opened it what it was!"

"Then why-"

"Because! Because there's stuff in there… It's true. It's all things we've done. None of them are good. Some of them were the darkest parts of our lives… and for them to get out? We'd all be liable for his death."

"Are you-" she started, taking a moment to breathe. "Are you saying you're responsible?"

"I- I don't know. I think, maybe, it wasn't just me... It was all of us."

"Who is going to tell if we destroy it? Who is the third party?"

Harry balled his fists and drew back from the table. "I don't know. Whoever it is, we know that it's not one of us."

She ran her fingers over the binding, the only connection Draco had to the mortal world was in the palm of her hand, diminished to a short book.

She had the power to destroy it, as did the people that came before her. Yet, no one had. She knew most of them didn't care for Draco while he was alive. Why would they all have continued turning the pages if they hadn't done something?

Why would anyone want to continue reading if they weren't at fault somehow?

Curiosity?

But even Harry wouldn't have been so careless as to entertain a Horcrux for mere curiosity. Which meant all those people played a part. So had Harry. And so had she.

* * *

A/N: This will be the shortest chapter. I had this idea last night, and I couldn't get it out of my head. Sorry if you're waiting for me to finish AFU. I wrote the last chapter already for it, just need to edit. Thank you for reading!


	2. Astoria Greengrass: The Ruthless

**Astoria Greengrass: The Ruthless**

* * *

The hallways were pitch black. Hermione was relying on the dim light of her wand to navigate, but even that small amount of light greatly increased her chances of being caught.

She wanted to borrow Harry's invisibility cloak, but after their earlier conversation she decided against it. She knew she wasn't ready to talk to him again. At least, not until she had a grasp of what they had all done.

The next time she opened the diary, there was a flash of an image and a command. ' _Read it there._ ' She never saw the images or the stories on the pages, it was all in her head. Which made this dark magic seem even more threatening.

She knew she was risking house points, and if any of her classmates were to find out she was sneaking out in the middle of the night to walk to school grounds, she'd be a phara for a week. She wasn't able to stop herself though, because she had to follow the rules. Just not the school rules at the moment.

Up she went, with barely lighting and over a hundred uneven stairs to climb, but she made it. She put her wand away, as the moonlight was now enough to illuminate the owlery. The floors there were usually filthy. She thanked the high heavens that Filch had cleaned the owlery that day, because she was exhausted, and all she wanted to do was sit down.

She opened the book once more, her heart felt like it was beating out of her chest as she waited for his swift, clear penmanship to grace the pages.

' _It's beautiful at night. Isn't it Hermione?"_

Hermione nodded, feeling sad that he knew it was a beautiful night but wasn't here to enjoy it. There was a long silence. Hermione wondered if he did this with everyone. Interacting with them, making them go places before he told a story. Hermione doubted Harry was running around the castle at night at the command of Draco.

' _I'm going to show you why this place is the beginning, but I want you to know something first. It wasn't all as typical as you all may have assumed. Even you, Hermione._

She felt a pull, and a second later she was standing next to her. He was so close to her. She knew it wasn't really him, but still, she wanted to reach out and touch him. To pretend for a moment he was still alive.

But he wasn't, and despite her inner war, he kept talking, unperturbed.

 _After the war ended, my family went through our trials. My mother and I were able to escape punishment, but my father was sentenced to live in the shadows, unable to leave our own house for the next five years. Perhaps they didn't know, but they were not only sentencing him, but they were also punishing us for his discretions. He blamed us both. He wasn't violent with us, but if we were to leave, there was animosity, and the conversation usually ended in a battle to get us to stay._

 _We knew he was lonely, and that was intended to be his punishment, but five years is a long time without anyone to be near but your family. He had no escape, and he didn't want us to have an escape either._

 _I hadn't exactly been eager to return to Hogwarts, but it was better than being home. As selfish as it was, I couldn't stay there anymore._

 _It was the third week back when Astoria asked me to meet her here, he said, sucking his teeth and frowning. And this is where my hell truly began._

"Draco," Astoria started, "I'm glad you came."

Draco leaned against the wall, watching closely as she sent a letter off with her owl.

"And what was that?"

"You know damn well what that was," she replied, throwing him a dirty look and zipping her bag.

"You don't seem very happy," he said, smiling. Hermione had seen that smile over and over again in her head since his death. Before she knew about the journal, she'd often asked herself how someone who could smile like that could kill himself.

"Not everyone is interested in marrying you," she replied. "In fact, save for Pansy, I think most girls would loath to even be in the same room as you."

"Yet, here you are."

"Here I am," she said. "I know we have to get married. I've accepted that, but if you accept this too, you need to extinguish any current flames, or I'll tear your world apart before you've even had a chance to apologize."

Draco put his hands up and chuckled. "Like you said, it's not like I have loads of people waiting in line to date me."

"I'm serious, Draco, not one toe out of line."

Their scene faded, and they stood in the great hall, next to the Slytherin table. Draco kept his voice low, but he got closer so she could hear him better.

 _That was the first time I had ever spoken to Astoria. She was stunningly beautiful, and I thought she was somewhat apathetic to me and what I had been through. So, in that moment, I really believed we would marry, and that it would be a real step to reconciling my past discretions._

 _But I also took her apathy for weakness._

 _Thinking there wouldn't be consequences to my actions… what a fool I was…_ He shook his head and continued. _Four months later, I realised she wasn't the one. There was something deep inside me stirring, and she realised it too._

"Draco," Astoria said cordially while sitting down next to him in the great hall.

Draco looked up, not paying much attention to her, or the food in front of him that he had been pushing around all morning.

"I heard an interesting rumor last night," she said, placing her napkin in her lap. She waited a moment before speaking again. "Nothing to say?"

"You haven't given me much to go on," he said, frowning into his breakfast.

"I think you know what I'm talking about."

Draco looked at the Gryffindor table then back to Astoria and rolled his eyes. He inclined his head. "You're talking about me helping the princess to her tower?"

She hummed. "So it's true?"

"Good Godric. Astoria," he said, pointing a fork in the general direction of the Gryffindor table. "She's developing a hunch carrying around those books."

"People are getting the wrong idea," she hissed under her breath.

"Now I know not to help-"

"That's not the problem. The problem is you're 'helping her' in the library, the hallways, in class… good Godric, Draco, I'm not a fool. And I might not be able to see it myself, but unlike you, I have friends in your classes."

"You're out of line," he said, a little louder than appropriate. A few of the first years sitting next to him shuffled around, leaving their breakfast behind while they made their way out the great hall.

"This is the last time, Draco. I swear to Merlin. This is the last time I'm going to let you embarrass me."

Draco didn't say anything as she brushed her sleek, long brown hair over her shoulder and made her way out behind the first years he scared off.

Hermione almost wished he had followed after her.

Instead, he watched Hermione talking animatedly about something to Harry. Ron was stealing food off her plate while she wasn't looking, earning giggles from Ginny. Harry was trying to pay attention to Hermione, but when Ron opened wide and theatrically bit into a piece of bacon, he laughed so loudly some of the Slytherins even turned around.

Hermione turned her attention to the red head, and gave him a light push. She looked up at the Slytherin table and they locked eyes, but only for a brief moment. Draco grabbed his rucksack and left, with a slight smile on his lips.

' _It wasn't until a few weeks later until I understood exactly what Astoria meant when she threatened me in the owlery._

She always assumed that his being kind to her was for some sort of redemption, not whatever Astoria was alluding to. She blushed, thinking that Harry, or anyone for that matter had seen this vision.

Hermione and Draco strolled together in silence into the hallway until they reached a the hallway with the choir room. Cormac was leaning against a wall, while Draco was coming from the other side of the hallway.

"Malfoy," Cormac Mclaggen called, giving his ashy-blonde hair a runthrough with his hand. "You and Astoria?"

It was brightly lit, but despite that, Draco had dark circles beneath his eyes. Draco kept walking past him, sparing him a tiny glance before decidedly ignoring him.

"You're engaged, but she doesn't seem to like you very much," he said, lips quirked up. "At least, that's what she told me."

Not even Hermione predicted that Draco would toss him against the wall, using his forearm to cut off his air supply. "You think this is funny?" he said.

"Draco!" An angry voice yelled from across the hall. Hermione turned around. Pansy. "Draco, let go of him."

To Hermione's surprise, he let go in one swift move, leaving Cormac doubled over, gasping for air.

Pansy grabbed his elbow, and they watched as Cormac practically ran down the hall away from them.

"Draco," she gasped, "What is wrong with you?"

"He was asking for it. Fucking-"

"I don't care about him. You can't be doing stuff like this, and what's all this nonsense about Granger?"

"Pansy," he warned, drawing in a breath in his nose, but despite his obvious annoyance, she continued.

"No, Draco. I'm serious. Astoria and Dalphene have been keeping me up all night about it-"

"It's true, okay?" He wasn't looking at her, but he didn't seem ashamed either. "It's true. I fell for her. Not on purpose, though, if that makes it any better."

Pansy snorted. "It doesn't."

"I'm serious Pans. It's like I can't feel anything when she's not there. And when I'm around her, I feel better. She doesn't feel the same way, though. She practically begs me to leave her alone. I hear her friends talking about how she shouldn't see me-"

"Then leave her alone! I think Astoria may kill you if you don't."

"It's not that simple, Hermione is-"

"I don't care!" she cut him off. "No one cares. What matters is what our parents want. And they want you with Astoria. Just be glad it's not me, because _I_ would have killed you by now."

"Pans," he started, but was cut off.

"You need to fix this," she said, running her fingers through her black, bob cut hair. "For your own sake."

Draco sent them into another memory. They were standing at the top of the owlery again, but this time, Draco was alone, leaning over the railing with a letter in his hand. His face looked gaunt, paler than usual, and he looked a bit thinner. She didn't remember him ever looking like that. He always looked so bright when he was with her, even when she told him to leave.

Hermione looked into one of the gaps in the stone walls, there was still a hint of snow on the ground. They were creeping up on spring. They were close to his end.

She peeked over his shoulder, reading the paper between his wind chapped fingers. It was from his parents, telling him not to talk to them until Astoria and him were married. They'd heard the rumors from Astoria, and were perturbed by the situation.

He dropped his head, leaning further into the metal bars and threw the note for the wind to take it far away.

Hermione put her arm around his shoulders. She could feel him, but it was a cold and inhuman form. She felt more sympathy for him now than anyone in her life, at least it felt like that. Maybe that was only because she knew how this ended. She couldn't be there for him. She wondered if she had stumbled on him, at this very moment, how she would have reacted. Even seeing him in this state, she might just turn away and leave. Hermione hoped she wouldn't have, but she didn't know then what she knew now.

"He can't be helped, Hermione," the Draco behind her said.

She nodded. "I know. I'm sorry."

"Whatever for? You didn't know anything about what was going on. I didn't want you to know."

Hermione leaned back one one of the metal poles in the center. "You'd made it a point to see me every day- Why didn't you say anything?"

Hermione was snapped back to reality before he could answer. She jerked her head up to the figure staring down at her.

"Granger? What are you doing?"

Blaise Zabini. Hermione knew next to nothing about him, except that he was a prefect, and that he was usually very lenient with Slytherins.

"Reading," she said, lifting the book and standing up.

He grabbed the book, but the contents were empty. "Uncharm it," he said.

"Impossible. It's not my charm."

"I'm sure you can come up with a counter to it," he said, "think hard."

"Even if I wanted to," she said, "I wouldn't do it for you."

He narrowed his eyes at her and flipped the book closed. "You know I could confiscate this, right? I can feel the dark magic in it."

Hermione looked at the staircase, as though making an escape would help her. She knew it wouldn't, but she knew she could be expelled for this. Her stomach curled and she thought she might puke.

"But rule breaking and tainted magic is a quite an interesting look for you, and I'm not going to be the one to squash this hobby." He slammed it back down in her empty palm. "Read in your room next time."

She tried to smile, but it came out as a grimace. "I'll be on my way."

"Not so fast," he said. Hermione turned around, one more sentence away from throwing the journal at him. "10 points from Gryffindor."

Hermione rolled her eyes and kept walking. Blaise would be a nuisance, as would all the other prefects.


End file.
